24 Accidental Scientific Discoveries That Changed the World

Gentle voiced paint yogi Bob Ross used to say "we don't make mistakes, we just have happy accidents." What's true in six-minute landscape painting is also true in the science world, as the glorious nerds at Mental Floss explain.

Some of these accidental discoveries are pretty well known, at least among the type of folks who have enough free time and few enough friends to dedicate this stuff to memory (guilty). Some are really surprising, and kinda funny. So go on out there and keep accidentally mixing stuff with other stuff, you could be on your way to the next great scientific discovery. [Mental Floss]